CYPMHS stands for Child and Young People's Mental Health Service. It's a service for children and young people under 18 and their families and it's part of the NHS.
You may also see the term children and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) used. This is an older term for the main specialist NHS community service within the wider CYPMHS. CYPMHS is a specialist mental health service for children and young people. Our staff are highly trained in a range of different assessment techniques and evidence based therapies. Staff work closely in teams so that we can offer services tailored to the needs of the children, young people and families we see.
Leeds CAMHS is now known as Children and Young People’s Mental Health Services (CYPMHS). As part of continually striving to improve the service we deliver, Community CYPMHS has made some changes to the way we structure our teams. We have not made any changes to what you can expect to receive in terms of assessment, support, treatment or intervention but we have restructured this service into 3 new pathway teams to make it more clear for our children, young people and families to know who to contact if they are open to Leeds CYPMHS and what services we offer.
Therapy Team (including Medication)
The Children and Young People’s Therapy Team provide interventions for children and young people who have been identified as needing additional support to manage moderate to severe mental health difficulties. We support young people with difficulties such as: low mood/ depression, anxiety, trauma, obsessive compulsive disorder, and complex emotional difficulties.
We are able to provide a variety of therapeutic interventions for young people: Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, Interpersonal Therapy, Psychotherapy, Family Therapy and Systemic Interventions, and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. We offer these interventions through a variety of methods, including individual and group work, and virtually or face to face. In addition, we are able to consider offering medication if this is identified as being appropriate if talking therapies are not successful.
Medication will also be considered following a diagnosis of ADHD after assessment by the Neurodevelopmental Team.
How to get in touch with the Therapy Team: email at lcht.therapyteam.cypmhs@nhs.net or telephone 0113 8434468
How to get in touch with the Medication Team: email at meds.cypmhs@nhs.net or telephone 0113 843 2711
Enhanced Support Team
The Enhanced Support Team undertake extended assessments with children, young people and their families who are already open to CYPMHS to understand what support is needed. The team also works with children and young people who need an enhanced level of support during times of crisis. This work can include supporting the child, young person, and their family to manage risk and individual work on goal setting and dealing with difficult emotions. Our multi-disciplinary team will help to coordinate the work of other agencies, including school and social care, and work closely with the therapy team to develop the best support plan for each child or young person.
How to get in touch with the Enhanced Support Team: email at lcht.cypmhs.enhancedsupport@nhs.netor telephone 0113 8430804
Neurodevelopmental Assessment Team
The Neurodevelopmental Assessment Team undertake autism and ADHD assessments for those children and young people who meet the criteria for CAMHS. This is a specialist multi-disciplinary team who, using a clinic model which is in line with NICE guidelines, consider whether a diagnosis of ADHD and/or autism is appropriate for each young person that they see.
Further information about our service, how to make referrals and where to find support whilst waiting for assessments can be found on the Neurodiversity information hub - MindMate
How to contact the Neurodevelopmental Assessment Team: email at nd.cypmhs@nhs.net or telephone 0113 8432720
First Appointments
Risk Assessments: All children, young people and families that come to Leeds CYPMHS are required to have a risk assessment.
A risk assessment is a helpful tool for children, young people, families and staff to identify areas which may require some additional support.
In Leeds CYPMHS, a risk assessment is talked about in your first appointment. The CYPMHS clinician may ask some specific questions so they can understand if there are any concerns that you may need help with. The questions they ask may include “Do you have thoughts of self-harm or suicide?” or “Are you aggressive towards other people?” They may also ask your parents/carers questions. Be as honest as you can. We’re not here to judge you; we are here to help you.
The answers you give may lead to the CYPMHS clinician suggesting that others need to be involved in your care. This may be a CYPMHS Doctor or someone else such as a teacher at school.
If there are risks that you need help with, then together we will complete a plan called an ‘Our Plan’. This will give helpful hints and tips on how best to manage your worries and provide you with contact numbers / web pages for other services that can help.
Further Assessment and Therapy
If you need more help from CYPMHS following these sessions, we will plan together a package of care to suit you. Because we fit it around what you need, there is no one next step, but you will get a say in deciding what comes next.
Some options are:
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Specialist assessment: Examples of some of the specialist assessments we carry out are assessments for ADHD, eating disorders and Autistic Spectrum Conditions (ASC).
You can find out more about Autism and ADHD support for children and young people in Leeds at our Neurodiversity Information Hub
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Therapy: Examples of some of the specialist therapies we offer are cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), family therapy and creative therapies.
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Your therapist will talk through the options with you and what they think will work best for you.
Our service also includes a specialist team for children with learning disabilities and their families- services are tailored to take into account their specific needs.
Intensive assessment and treatment packages
For a very small number of young people, highly intensive assessment and treatment packages are needed. Children and young people offered this will usually have had significant previous input from within our service.
Leeds CYPMHS has an intensive outreach service and access to the West Yorkshire adolescent in-patient service.
CYPMHS nurses are also based in the Leeds YOTs (Youth Offending Teams).
Feeling comfortable and being able to talk freely is important. We will check with you what information we can share and who with. There are sometimes situations where we must share information (for example if someone was in danger). We would try to discuss this with you first. Any records we keep about you or your sessions are stored very securely.
To make sure we offer the best quality care we check how well we are doing. To do this we collect and analyse information. This is done within our organisation and nationally (to see how we compare to CAMHS services in other areas).
You can find out more about what happens to your information on the NHS Digital website.
